Fitch Ratings last week removed Northwest's debt from "Rating Watch Negative," while affirming the current ratings of 'B+' for Northwest's senior unsecured debt securities. Fitch made a similar move on Continental last week. Fitch's action "reflects the latest signs of stabilization in Northwest's cash flow position that have begun to appear over the last several weeks."
Boston-Maine Airways will begin service between Baltimore Washington and Atlantic City March 4, using Jetstream turboprops. It will also add a daily connection with Portsmouth, N.H., and White Plains, N.Y.
Alaska Air Group reported that it had $595 million in cash and short-term investments on Jan. 31. The amount is down about 10% or $65 million from Dec. 31, primarily due to payment of deferred transportation taxes and Horizon aircraft lease payments.
Biometric identification raises varying concerns over how to implement it, according to Transportation Security head John Magaw. There "may be a place" for a passenger ID system, but that would "have to be voluntary," he said. A national ID program for transport workers is "almost like profiling in law enforcement...and that's a no-no."
Honeywell named David Cote as it new president and CEO, effective immediately, after Cote resigned as the top executive at TRW. Before joining TRW, Cote spent 25 years in various management and leadership positions at GE. Lawrence Bossidy will remain chairman and a member of the board of Honeywell until June 30 when he will retire as previously announced. The TRW board established a chief executive office to direct the company while it seeks a permanent successor.
Sabre yesterday revealed a plan to launch a cash tender offer for the remaining 30% stake of Travelocity.com outstanding common stock that Sabre does not already own. Sabre said it will offer $23 per share to acquire the balance of the 15 million shares of Travelocity's common stock. The offer represents a 20% premium over Friday's closing price of $19.20.
NTSB is concerned about how FAA has enforced parts of a sweeping 1997 rule on digital flight data recorders (DFDR) and wants the agency to report back with a corrective action plan by early March.
Mesaba and its flight attendants have reached a tentative agreement on their first contract, according to the Association of Flight Attendants. Tim Evenson, president of the AFA local, said the pact, under negotiation since last May, provides for pay increases and improvements in scheduling land work rules "that will enhance the quality of life of every Mesaba flight attendant."
British Airways announced Saturday that it had reconsidered its previous decision to stop service between London and Buenos Aires, which will be served three times a week from Heathrow instead of Gatwick as of April 1. Flights will operate Sunday, Tuesday and Friday.
The Greek government is expected to make an announcement on the future of state-owned carrier Olympic Airways after the latest attempt to privatize the airline failed over the weekend. Business daily Imerisia reported that the government planned to set up a new company that would operate on all the routes that are currently profitable. According to the paper, the government also would provide a EUR180 million loan to Olympic to cover current operating expenses. The new airline would employ about 5,000 of the current 7,500 staff. The report has not yet been confirmed.
Transportation Security Administration yesterday fired a security screener at the Louisville, Ky., airport who was asleep on the job, a TSA spokeswoman confirmed. The screener, who appeared to be dozing off, was removed from his post at 6:30 a.m., and a TSA security agent immediately began an evacuation and a search of the concourse -- standard procedure -- and the concourse reopened an hour later. Fifteen flights were delayed and 1,000 passengers were rescreened. Reports said the screener was an employee of Globe Aviation, which handles screening at Louisville.
Irish no-frills carrier Ryanair plans to fly on German domestic routes as of spring 2003. The airline's CEO Michael O'Leary told German weekly Welt am Sonntag that he has reached an agreement with three additional German airports and is in negotiations with a further eight. Ryanair already operates from Frankfurt-Hahn and Lubeck airports and will add a Friedrichshafen-London service this spring.
In a ruling that could well be of key importance for Germany's domestic air travel market, the country's Cartel Office has ruled that Lufthansa has to raise its fares on one of the most important domestic routes. If the ruling is confirmed by the courts, new-entrant carriers could enjoy significant protection in markets where they directly compete against Lufthansa. The cartel office decided in the case of the Frankfurt-Berlin route, where Germania started services late last year with Boeing 737-700s.
America West's pilot union voted unanimously last week to replace Roger Cox with Herb Holland as chairman of the union's Master Executive Council. Holland, an AWA Captain, has been with the carrier since 1990. ALPA's Master Executive Council for AWA consists of four elected representatives and three officers. Scheduled contract negotiations are to resume next month between America West and ALPA.
DOT extended the expiration deadline for its computer reservations system (CRS) rules by a year, to March 31, 2003, stating that it "expects to issue a notice of proposed rulemaking regarding the substantive issues that might be addressed in revised CRS rules later this year." This latest extension of the current rules follows several extensions dating back to 1997, when DOT began a CRS rules review.
EVA Air plans to move its Tokyo service to Narita International Airport from Haneda Airport, and through a code-sharing partnership with Air Nippon Airways, increasing the daily frequencies from two flights weekly to three. The new and expanded service will start April 18 and will be operated with a Boeing 767-300ER in a two-class configuration. The increased service was attributed to the opening of a second runway at Narita. EVA said it is working with travel agents to develop tour packages to the country.
U.S. Major Carriers Traffic January 2002 (000) January January % 2002 2001 Change Alaska Revenue Passenger Miles 893,500 889,400 0.5 Available Seat Miles 1,430,000 1,503,000 -4.9 Load Factor (%) 62.5 59.2 America West
Atlas Air pilots and flight engineers represented by ALPA failed to ratify a tentative agreement they reached with the company on Jan. 25, the company said yesterday. Bill Allen, senior VP human resources, said the company is "ready to return to the bargaining table as soon as new sessions are scheduled by the mediator. Currently, we expect that will be in early March."
Spanish national carrier Iberia has achieved a small traffic growth in January 2002, after its traffic shrank for three consecutive months following the Sept. 11 events. It posted a 0.4% increase in RPMs while its load factor improved by 0.3 pp. to 64.8%. Capacity remained stable. The airline experienced a shift to longer-haul routes, as the total number of passengers decreased by 3.9% in spite of the RPM increase. If figures of Binter Mediterraneo -- which Iberia sold last year -- are excluded from the January 2001 results, the traffic decline was 2.9%.
Continental, for months resisting the installation of priority passenger airport security lines, announced last week that it would provide such a service at its three hubs. While other U.S. airlines late last year started using priority security lanes for elite frequent flyers, Continental CEO Gordon Bethune said there were no plans to follow. "We're adding more equipment across our network so no passenger has to wait," he said (DAILY, Dec. 10).
United, which on Monday reached agreement on a tentative contract with mechanics and related workers represented by the IAM, still must reach a settlement with its ramp agents, also an IAM-represented group, and then must wrest concessions from all its unions on belt-tightening tactics. Nevertheless, the agreement with its mechanics should help stem what one analyst believes could have been a loss of up to $150 million in booked revenue for the two to three weeks following today's strike deadline.
U.S. air traffic control system needs to be automated to deal proactively with the long-expected increase in commercial traffic as well as the very real possibility of large growth in air taxi services, according to Robert Walker, chairman of the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry. ATC modernization is hamstrung by "lots of people who think they have jurisdiction...and clash with each other," with the result being that "nothing ever gets done," Walker told The DAILY in an interview.
Embraer 170 made its first flight yesterday, completing a two-hour, 30-minute series of tests upon leaving the company's Sao Jose dos Campos facility in Brazil. Using six aircraft, Embraer hopes to gain certification by the end of the year. But the company acknowledged yesterday that a two-month delay in the 70-seat jet's pre-flight test phase could push the schedule back. "Embraer will immediately re-evaluate the program schedule in the coming days to determine if this [certification schedule] is still feasible," the company said.
